Corporate raider made initial fortune buying up, restructuring poorly managed companies; later opened pioneering hedge fund Gekko Partners. Widely credited on the street for creating collateralized debt obligations (CDOs); said to have shorted S&P 500 and banks near peak. Conspicuously seen celebrating at Manhattan restaurant the night
Lehman Brothers
collapsed: “Greed is good … for me, not them!” Despite swelling fortune, rumored to be lobbying U.S. government for billions in bailout funds.